The present disclosure relates generally to systems and methods useful in medicine, cellular biology, nanotechnology, and cell culturing. In particular, at least in some embodiments, the present disclosure relates to systems and methods for magnetic guidance and patterning of cells and materials. Some specific applications of these systems and methods are levitated culturing of cells away from a surface, making and manipulating patterns of levitated cells, and patterning culturing of cells on a surface.
As interest in nanotechnology, materials, and cellular biology has grown, it has become evident that a limitation is the ability to control and manipulate the pattern of cells and materials which are useful for cellular biology and medicine (such as cell culturing, tissue engineering, stem cell research, drug and nanoparticle delivery, bio-sensors, and gene delivery), molecular and bioelectronics, and the construction of complex materials.
During development of living organisms, structure and order in the form of patterns naturally emerge through mechanisms that are still not fully understood. If one wants to study or replicate living tissue in an artificial environment, it is critical to be able to reproduce natural patterns. The ability to engineer and manually control the patterns of living cells, especially in three-dimensions and on surfaces, will enable many bioengineering and medical applications.
Cell culturing is an essential tool in many areas of biotechnology, such as stem cell research, tissue engineering, and drug discovery. Traditional cell culturing in Petri dishes produces two-dimensional (2D) cell growth with gene expression, signaling, and morphology that can differ from conditions in living organisms, and thus compromise clinical relevancy. Certain limitations of traditional cell culturing in recapitulating the attributes of tissues in living organisms may result from their 2D nature. While rotating bioreactors or protein-based gel environments have been developed in attempts to allow three-dimensional (3D) cell culturing, broad application of such methods has been severely hampered by high-cost or complexity. Thus, a platform technology to enable 3D cell culturing is still an unmet need.
In many cases, an ideal cell culturing environment is one that promotes fast and robust growth of healthy cells, in which the cell morphology and function are dominated by cell-cell interactions, cell-specific signaling, and/or experimental control variables, rather than the properties of the artificial culturing medium. Often, it is desirable to grow cells that resemble in substantially every way cells grown in living organisms, including gene expression, functional characteristics of differentiated cells, and the formation of an extracellular matrix. Cost and scalability of production are also critical considerations as far as the application potential of such technologies.
Furthermore, as the use of nano-sized materials and cultured cells continue to develop, it is increasingly difficult to develop systems for safely manipulating and handling these entities. For example, regulatory agencies and good laboratory practices often attempt to minimize the amount of exposure of materials to external objects, so as to minimize contamination. Aside from such practices, the integrity of such materials may be compromised by such an exposure. Thus, devices which can manipulate nano-sized materials and cells and tissue without exposure to external objects may be desirable.
The features and advantages of the present disclosure will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of the description of the embodiments that follows.